Before the Public Library: Reading, Community, and Identity in the Atlantic World, 1650-1850

Contents: 

1. Building Religious Communities with Books: the Quaker and Anglican Transatlantic Libraries, 1650-1710 / Louisiane Ferlier
2. Poetry and Civic Urbanism in the Coffee-house Library in the Mid-eighteenth Century / Markman Ellis
3. Of Mudfish, Harpsichords and Books: Libraries and Community in Eighteenth-century Jamaica / April G. Shelford
4. Affleck Generations: the Libraries of the Boswells of Auchinleck,1695-1825 / James J. Caudle
5. Sedition, Revolution and Libertinism In Eighteenth-century Brazil: the Library Of Naturalist Jose Vieira Couto / Junia Ferreira Furtado
6. Uncommon Knowledge: Late Eighteenth-century American Subscription Library Collections / Cheryl Knott
7. Reading Sheffield: Sheffield Libraries and Book Clubs, 1771-1850 / Sue Roe and Loveday Herridge
8. Challenging Institutional Ambitions: the Practice of Book Exchanges at the New York Society Library, 1789-1795 / Rob Koehler
9. A "Quaint Corner" of the Reading Nation: Romantic Readerships in Rural Perthshire, 1780-1830 / Katie Halsey
10. From Private Devotion to "Public" Education: Northern Dissenting Academy Libraries and their Benefactors / Rachel Eckersley
11. The Foundation of Plymouth Public Library: Cultural Status, Philanthropy and Expanding Readerships, 1810-1825 / Annika Bautz
12. Reading on the Edge of the Atlantic: the Easton Library Company / Christopher Phillips
13. Crafting Respectability: the Politics of Class at the Mechanic Apprentices' Library of Boston / Lynda K. Yankaskas
14. Reading Publics: Books, Communities and Readers in the Early History of American Public Libraries / Tom Glynn
15. From Voluntary to State Action: Samuel Smiles, James Silk Buckingham and the Rise of the Public Library Movement in Britain / Alistair Black